All posts tagged disaster

Although more aid is arriving in Tacloban, the number of people streaming into the city searching for loved ones is complicating the relief effort. The WSJ’s James Hookway gives us a first-hand account from the ground. Read More »

Days after a powerful typhoon barreled through the central Philippines, foreign donors are opening their wallets and rushing to provide humanitarian assistance to help the country cope with the monumental challenge of rescue and relief.

The head of the United Nation’s emergency relief arm said it would provide $25 million to assist with relief efforts and launched a flash appeal for others to contribute. Read More »

A minor, 4.5-magnitude earthquake on Tuesday shook Bohol, the central Philippine province that last month was the epicenter of a massive temblor that claimed 222 lives, left thousands homeless and destroyed city buildings and centuries-old churches.

The shallow earthquake has not produced any deaths or injuries and is not expected to cause any major damage, but it comes at a time when the Philippines is struggling to provide aid and carry out rescue efforts for victims of Typhoon Haiyan. Read More »

At the Villamor air base in Manila Tuesday, US marines scrambled to load C-130 military transport planes headed toward Tacloban with bales of rice, bottled water and canned goods – much of it sourced from civilian donations to the Philippines’ major television networks.

Typhoon Haiyan fractured logistics networks in dozens of provinces after barreling through on Friday, leaving Tacloban – one of the worst affected areas – and its swelling population of refugees increasingly dependent on whatever supplies can be brought in by military aircraft, as well as by boat or road. Read More »

The devastation wrought by Typhoon Haiyan could shave as much as 1.4% off Philippine economic output this year and drive up inflation, but won’t significantly slow the country’s economic momentum, HSBC wrote in a report Tuesday.

It also said the disaster highlighted the country’s infrastructure shortcomings and exposed the urgent need for the government to boost public-works investment. Read More »

Cebu Air, Inc. expects to resume normal flights by Tuesday just days after a devastating typhoon ravaged the Philippines and at the same time that another storm is moving in, the airline said on Monday.

The carrier, which operates as Cebu Pacific Air and is the country’s biggest budget carrier, had to cancel more than 180 round-trip flights from last Thursday because of Typhoon Haiyan, which has killed more than 250 people and left thousands more feared dead. Read More »

With nearly 500 dead and thousands more missing, the coastal town of Basey on Samar island in central Philippines is the latest town to have exposed how much damage Typhoon Haiyan has wrought on the Southeast Asian country.

Since the massive storm struck on Friday, Tacloban, on Leyte Island, has been the focus of international relief and rescue efforts. But Basey, around 360 miles south of Manila, appears to be just as devastated. Read More »

A tropical depression being called Zoraida entered Philippine waters early on Monday, and while it arrives just days after super-typhoon Haiyan devastated a large swathe of the central section of the Southeast Asian country, it may likely pass by areas ravaged by that disaster. Read More »

The airport in Tacloban City, badly damaged by the storm surge stirred by super-typhoon Haiyan last Friday, has begun to service commercial flights, albeit limited to small, propeller-driven aircraft.

Captain John Andrews, deputy director general of the Civil Aviation Authority of the Philippines, said the Tacloban Airport would accept around 20 flights each day, each carrying up to 90 passengers.

Though the airport’s runway remains serviceable despite the damage to the rest of the facility caused by storm surges, Mr. Andrews said airplanes will have to do a visual approach because ground equipment has been damaged.

Heavy rains have continued in many parts of northern Vietnam after Typhoon Haiyan hit the northern coastal areas of the country in the early morning hours carrying wind speeds of up to 73 miles per hour near the eye of the storm. Rainfall ranged from 6 inches in the coastal province of Quang Ninh to 15 inches in the northeast province of Lang Son.

Meanwhile, a new storm is headed to the Philippines, with 35 mile per hour center winds. The storm remains over the ocean, where water temperatures will determine whether or not it intensifies. Currently, it is headed for Surigao province in Mindanao, near to the provinces hit hardest by Typhoon Haiyan. Read More »

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